Tyler Robinson, the man accused in the killing of conservative activist Charlie Kirk last year, will stand trial on capital murder charges, a Utah judge ruled Tuesday, clearing the way for the state to pursue the death penalty.

The decision by District Judge Tony Graf Jr. came after a final day of arguments in a preliminary hearing that began in July. Prosecutors argued there was probable cause of aggravated murder and six other counts against Robinson, and defense lawyers contended the state failed to prove the grounds required for a capital case. Robinson pleaded not guilty on Tuesday to seven charges, including aggravated murder.

Prosecutors alleged that Robinson, in shooting Kirk as he spoke before a large crowd at Utah Valley University, put Kirk’s staff and hundreds of people in the audience in a “zone of danger,” making the killing a capital crime.

The defense argued that the state didn’t prove Robinson knew he was endangering anyone else and that he hadn’t been a threat to others. 

Kirk’s widow, Erika Kirk, along with his parents, Rob and Kathy Kirk, were in attendance.

The courthouse drew a crowd on Tuesday, as it had throughout the hearing. True crime obsessives, Turning Point USA supporters and conspiracist creators lined up before dawn for one of the few public seats inside. Outside and online, they traded alternative theories about the case that have proliferated since the day Charlie Kirk was shot.

The widest-reaching of those theories, spread most notably by podcaster and former Turning Point employee Candace Owens, hold without evidence that Robinson was a patsy in a larger plot, and that Charlie Kirk’s real killer is being shielded by a cast of characters that includes the government, Israel, Turning Point and Erika Kirk.

Beyond causing turmoil for Charlie Kirk’s family and organization, the conspiracy theories have affected the actual case, too, with prosecutors and the defense crediting the baseless claims and their creators with disrupting the proceedings and potentially impacting a jury. 

Prosecutors have stressed the volume of their actual evidence in court filings.

“After admitting to several friends, including his roommate and romantic partner, that he assassinated Charlie Kirk at Utah Valley University on September 10, 2025, in front of approximately 3000 eyewitnesses, Defendant surrendered to law enforcement for that crime,” they wrote in a bind over memorandum, adding that “DNA testing, surveillance video, and eyewitness testimony buttress those elements.”

A network of well-paid conspiracist creators, Owens among them, has discounted that evidence to millions of viewers, mostly on YouTube. They contend that surveillance footage of Robinson at the university — in a parking garage, in a stairwell and on the roof from which prosecutors say Charlie Kirk was shot — has been doctored or shows a decoy. They say law enforcement faked the confessions and the proceedings against Robinson constitute a “show trial.”

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